Pro Gun Control...

I don’t care what side of the issue everyone else is on, but I am pro gun control. In light of the shootings that took place in Sandy Hook Elementary School, and all the other shooting recently, it’s obvious to me that something needs to be done and done soon. We don’t have time to debate the issue ad nauseam. 

What happened at Sandy Hook was a tragedy. As I read up on the circumstances I was more and more concerned and upset. The guns used in the killings, by Adam Lanza, were registered to his mother, Nancy Lanza. She was a gun enthusiast and collector. She liked to go to target practice. She was proud of her collection, which was supposed to be for protection and ended up ironically being the reason she is dead. Her son, Adam, had serious mental issues. She was well aware of it. She even told his babysitter to never take his eyes off him when he was watching him. Yet, she exposed Adam to her collection and even taught him how to use a gun and shoot targets. Is that a responsible thing to do? What sense does that make? Maybe she was qualified to own weapons, but he was far from stable. Why on earth would any reasonable person do what she did? On top of that, I learned that Adam had with him enough ammunition with him to kill everyone at the school that morning. We are talking about 600 to 700 people. Did Nancy Lanza feel it was necessary to keep that much ammunition in her home? Even if the law says we can own guns, it doesn’t make it a good idea for everyone to do so. Sometimes common sense has to prevail. In this case it didn’t and 28 people are dead.

I don’t understand why it isn’t clear to everyone that we need to place restrictions on guns and ammunition. These types of incidents are escalating. When our founding fathers passed legislation saying we have the right to bear arms, they could not envision today’s society.  Mentally ill people are able to purchase guns and take their frustrations out on the innocent. We are not able to prevent these incidents from happening. We cannot predict who will snap and use guns to destroy the lives of the most innocent in our society. But we can take measures they make it much more difficult to acquire guns and make stiffer penalties for those who possess them without a license. Of course, that still would not have stopped Adam from getting his hands on a gun because his mother was irresponsible and grossly negligent. Whether she had her collection laying around or locked up, she put a gun in her son’s hand and taught him to shoot it. She gave him a taste of how it feels. Reality versus his video games. Sanity versus insanity. And 20 children and six teachers are being buried because of poor judgment and lack of common sense.

I was watching Dr. Phil yesterday. He jumped on the bandwagon of this tragedy. There were parents there speaking of how they are afraid of their children. One son pulled a knife on his mother. They had an escape plan in place where the two younger children were taught to run to the car, get in and lock it if there was ever any danger. The mother had to put all sharp instruments in a Tupperware box and carry it around with her. Another set of parents said their son would go into rages and blackout, not remembering what he had done. That father had a gun collection at home…locked up. Dr. Phil told him that wasn’t a good idea. And he made himself clear, NOT A GOOD IDEA. There is no lock strong enough to stop someone from breaking into it if they are determined to do so. If you have someone mentally unstable in your household, someone that has anger and rage issues, does someone really need to tell you to get rid of your guns? Come on, it’s a no brainer.

Gun control doesn’t mean that no one can own guns. It means we need to devise a better way so that only the most responsible citizens can acquire them. How many times have I heard people frustrated with the stupidity of others? Do we want those people armed and loaded with ammunition? We should know who owns guns and for what reason. I think we should limit the number of guns people can own and the amount of ammunition too. I think that people who want to own guns need to be certified by getting a certain number of hours of training too. We require that for driving a car, we should require if for shooting a weapon. What has to happen before we are all in agreement about this? How many more innocent lives must be lost? I just don’t understand it.

How we should go about this and what steps can and should be taken, I will leave to those who know more about it. There has to be a way to compromise and find a viable solution we can all live with, the emphasis is on the word “live.”